From Rocks to Roses: Meet Renaissance Man Ron Hooker

I met Ron Hooker on a September morning in the reference room of the Lompoc Valley Historical Society, as arranged by Karen Paaske, the organization’s dynamic president. Ron, who is remarkably robust at 95, was born in 1931 and has lived in Lompoc his entire life. 

His father left when he was an infant. He was raised by his mother, an uncle, and a web of steady, attentive relatives. He met his future wife, Dolores Linneman, when they were children. “She used to live across the street from me,” he recalled. “She said that when I was about seven years old, I threw rocks at her.” They met again in high school, class of 1949. They were married for 66 years; he still feels the ache of her absence.  

My preliminary research on Ron mentioned a business called Valley Rock, which he started in 1983 and sold when he retired at 61. But Ron has a long history of hard work and has held many different jobs throughout his life. At the age of 16, he worked at a service station that included a tire repair and body shop; he was entrusted with the keys and the combination to the safe, and was in charge and on duty even on Sundays. Despite one minor mishap in which the door of a brand-new Pontiac was nearly torn off, Ron grew in skill and confidence, and eventually he opened his own service station, Valley A, with a $200 loan. 

The next stop in Ron’s career was a job with Williams Brothers Markets. He was a checker and stocker, but he met the Lompoc Record rep to discuss store ads and was eventually put in charge of advertising there. “I took care of Safeway, and Linda’s Furniture Store, and J.C. Penney,” he said, “and I joined the Chamber of Commerce and got to know everybody.”

Knowing everybody led to a gig with Burt Romano, who ran a liquor store, and to 17 years at Janssen’s Liquor Store. And all of this does not include Ron’s time as a roustabout with Union Oil, where he started out climbing derricks in the oil fields. Ron met every test. During the 1960s and 1970s, with stunning versatility and entrepreneurial spirit, Ron and Dolores ventured into the realm of “hamburger joints”, opening up Jolly Cone, Taco Tiera, and Rondo’s, as well as two markets.

There was time out for fun too, particularly involving motorcycles and skiing. Ron enjoyed more than 70 years of motorcycle riding with Dolores as his passenger; he sold his last bike when he was 86. Another passion was snow skiing in different states and abroad, often traveling with friends and family.

But home was always Lompoc, where he and Dolores worked hard, raised their kids, and were an integral part of the community, cherishing the small-town feeling that still prevailed. Ron remembers a Lompoc where you waved hello at passing cars, stopped by to check the progress of a new house being built, and basically knew everyone.

Walking to and from school, neighbors greeted him all along the way. Mrs. Talbert gave out cookies; Chief Everett at the fire station would come out to chat; and George Howerton, who worked on the garbage truck, always had some treasure for him that he had picked up in the garbage, usually knives with broken blades. There were watermelons sold on the honor system — two cents a pound, coins left in a cup — and furtive nighttime visits to Schuyler’s cherry orchard.

Ron doesn’t just look back, though; he knows that life is about adapting, finding purpose, and staying involved. His advice to young people? Work hard and don’t give up. I began to see what keeps him going. Family, yes, and ongoing connection to friends and community, but he is also just curious, industrious, and engaged. He cooks, he gardens, he observes and learns, and tends to things. 

Roses, for example. He learned to care about roses from his uncle and his grandfather 70 years ago, who showed Ron how to make compost tea for the roses. That’s the secret: compost tea twice a year and recognizing that roses are sensitive to even subtle changes in microclimate. “Also, I’ve had seventy years to weed out the bad ones,” he adds, “and find the ones that thrive.”

The man is a cook, too, originally inspired by his mother’s chocolate meringue pie. Today, he has an oven that holds three casseroles and often hosts dinners for friends.

When you look back on your life at the age of 95, I ask Ron, did it all happen fast?

“Yes,” he replies, “And it picks up speed.” 

I guess there’s a message in that. Something about paying attention, slowing down, savoring, and sharing. I do these interviews because I appreciate people like Ron Hooker and the folks at the Lompoc Valley Historical Society who honor the stories, who have a sense of community and friendship, who understand that we are bearing witness.

Following our interview, we walked over to the museum in the 1875 Fabing-McKay-Spanne house for a tour of the rooms decked out for autumn. We come upon a display of the front page of the Lompoc Record from January 17, 1949. The headline reads: “VALLEY GETS ITS FIRST SNOW”. Ron stands there, remembering in vivid detail, as though it were yesterday, and he was still a kid.

“All the hills were white with snow, and everyone left school,” he recalled. “We went up Miguelito Canyon; there was a little more snow up there, but you couldn’t get over the grade at all with a car. All the hills were covered for two days — you could build a snowman, and it would be there the next day. We sledded down the hills on pieces of cardboard. It was amazing!”

We were time-traveling; it was a beautiful moment.